Final Post of the Year: Review, Thoughts, Previews and Things

Well folks long time no post and perfect timing its the end of the year. Its almost 2006 and now that 2005 is over I can take a look back at what went wrong, what went right and all the other stuff that went on this year from my eyes. But before I go there, I must say, New Years Eve ranks highly on the days of the year that I don't look forward to. I've always seen this day as a day that's overrated and wish that I could just sleep through because I don't see the hype behind it unless you're in New York at Time's Square or you are at Navy Pier in the Chi. It will be 6 years strong most likely without the ever elusive New Years Kiss. As we proceed...
JANUARY marked the return to Southern and some new things. No more roommate, I had a single room all to myself. I found myself refocused and rededicated and happy to be back. I partied it up while I could, but couldn't as much as my friends did last semester because after the house parties they were hitting up the bars, because in Carbondale all you have to be is 19 to get into the bars. Towards the end of January, I planned to make a positive move on Valentine's Day for once. Thinking that my past was behind me and the failures of V-Day's past would be unable to haunt me. However FEBRUARY came and the highlight of the month was the SIU confrence championship clinched on the home court against Witchita State. It was definetly the high-light of my college experience this year and last year. However, that was the only good to come out of this month. My Valentine's plan flopped due to my insecurities, my drunkeness, and in the end it was something that just wasn't meant to be. I've honestly dwelled upon it so much in this blog last year, if you really want to know what happened you can read posts from February til May of 2005. Oh yeah, I forgot to mention, the whole single room thing didn't work. Low on funds, lack of a job and a bit of chance happening that my suitemate's roommate pissed him off to the point he wanted to leave, I offered my room to him,. H e moved his stuff in to my room and since then we've been roommates. MARCH came and went with a bit of fan fare, but nothing to write home about. SIU made it to the NCAA tourney again which was totally awesome and we even won our first round match up. But in what was essentially a road game in Oklahoma City, SIU came short despite a first half lead and a late run in the second half came short of an upset of the #2 seed Oklahoma State. In the end, the team taht I had predicted to win the WHOLE thing in the beginning of the college hoops season won the whole damn thing in April when the University of North Carolina beat the 37-1 University of Illinois 75-70 in a great match-up which caused some interesting things. It had a torn campus half cheering the state school, big brother U of I, home of former coach Bruce Webber who began the run of excellence at Southern Illinois but bolted for the big bucks and the noteriety that comes with coaching in the Big Ten. Part of the campus found themselves cheering against the Illini seeing that Bruce Weber did spurn the Salukis and imagined the potential that they could have if they had their coach all along. Also part of it was just a feeling of dislike for a school that wasn't ours. Some of us, like me had different reasons. Being a big UNC fan since my childhood because of players like Jordan, Vince Carter, Jerry Stackhouse, Rasheed Wallace and the new guys like Sean May, Raymond Felton, Marvin Williams and Rashad McCants, my love for that team is why I cheered. My roommate on the other hand roots ACC over everyone, even though he is a Duke fan. APRIL came with hope of a 2005 championship for my Cubs, especially after the Red Sox crushed their curse. I cut school for opening day, taking a 6 hour plus train ride from Carbondale at 3 am to Chicago arriving around 9 am to arrive at Wrigley with my sign proclaiming I cut school for opening day. I made it on TV and I even got interviewed for the Chicago Tribune. However, opening day should have been a sign of things to come. Lack of production at the top of the order. A short outing by starter Kerry Wood and a blown save by LaTroy Hawkins and a Cubs loss was a sign of things to come. MAY school ended and I missed my SIU peeps, a lot. I was home sick for Carbondale as strange as that sounds. I missed the parties, living on my own and my friends. I would get in contact with them this summer which turned out to be the highlight of the summer. Oh and I also got back to my roots and played on a softball team with my friends from high school. I'll never forget our first scrimmage type game. At Warren Park in the rain, we made a major bottom of the 9th comeback which I led off and actually scored 2 runs that inning. JUNE 2005 had two high lights, both revolved around the Cubs. On June 18th I witnessed Cubs/Red Sox and had one of the best times at a ball game I had in a while. Not only did the Cubs win, but it was a great back and forth game where the Cubs won 7-6 without a Derrek Lee hit or a home run from anyone in fact. Dempster gave up two runs in the 9th to make it interesting but the Cubs won and shook Wrigley. I interacted with my Boston bretheren and have made unofficial plans to return the favor and go to Boston when the Cubs go whenever they go. I have nothing but kind words for Red Sox fans because they are knowledgeable, good-hearted and respectful baseball fans. June ended with the Cubs taking two-of-three at US Cellular against what would be the eventual world Champion Chicago White Sox (still sounds weird). The highlights of that weekend: Aramis Ramirez grand-slam against Jose Contreras in game two of the series and Mark Prior's complete dominance of the Sox in game 3. And my favorite depressed Hawk quote of the year: "And the Cubs have come in to US Cellular and taken two of three from the team with the best record in baseball." JULY was the highlight of the summer and here's why. My birthday, July 1st was the best day of the year. I turned 19, making me able to go into the bars in Carbondale. Not only that I welcomed my three best friends at Southern: my roommate Kevin, Steve from directly across the hall who was actually the second roommate because he basically lived in our room and Kristin. We went to the taste of Chicago and had a blast, we saw fireworks at Docs house and after Kristin and Hoos went to their homes, Steve stayed a few days and we partied, we chilled, we shopped and just had a blast. This birthday in July will be potentially even BIGGER with more invitations and possibly a combo-party. AUGUST was the turn month. It was the time where I went through the toughest time and everything that could go wrong went wrong. I got into my car accident a week before I was supposed to leave for school, the car ended up being totalled. My father didn't pay his part of the tuition bill on time, so all of my classes were cancelled, leaving me to settle for whatever was left just to be able to go to the university. My best friend was also involved in a car accident in which she was left in a coma and I learned about that the night that I was leaving to go to school. Those events set me back and put me in a very depressed mood that didn't go away until late in the school year. SEPTEMBER what's there to say, school started, my guy John left to go to basic training in the National guard, I partied it up upon my return to SIU and I came lookin to shake the magic v-card. Let's just say I still have it. OCTOBER was another sucky month. It sucked cuz the Sox won the World Series and I didn't hear the end of it, being the #1 Cubs fan and spokesperson for people who are actually Cub fans, not the assclowns that fill wrigley field for the experience, to pick up a date, whatever excuse people use. NOVEMBER'S highlights occured in a two week period. November 15th marked the highly anticipated Kanye West concert with me and my roommate and we had an awesome time singing every song and it was the event of the year in my eyes, well the highlight of this semester. Then came Thanksgiving, marking an end to my homesickness and all that good stuff. DECEMBER came and it was roller coaster of a month. At the end of November, I had an epiphany and everything came together, but it was too late. I hooked up my roomie with his g/f who liked, but you know since nothing was gonna happen, I just finished the job for them, well at least on his side. It was an up and down month partially because of that, I didn't know how I should feel, I was still taking shit from people and my grades definetly had me down. But in the end, everything came together again and I'm ready for next semester, refocused and reloaded. Christmas came, I got everything I wanted: a digital camera, Madden 06, College Hoops 2k6, Battlefronts II, 40 year old virgin, R. Kelly's trapped in the closet DVD, brown sugar, the sandlot, stewie griffin movie, I also bought fever pitch and american pie band camp. I got some clothes, a D. Lee jersey, a couple of button ups and some other good stuff.
That's it folks. I can't go on anymore with this. There's so much other stuff that happened that didn't make this thing and I'm sorry if I left out anything or anyone. Last year I made a list of people that helped me through this year. But there are so many that this year I can't mention them all, they know who they are and they know they are appreciated. Tomorrow I"ll come wtih my predictions and reactions from New Year's and things like that. Oh and I'll come with the stuff that I forgot, like oh yeah, December, THAT'S A BEARS WINNER AND A NFC NORTH DIVISION TITLE!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! From that high, to the ultimate low of the failed internet girlfriend that my roommate hooked me up with that ended up killing their fake self off and yeah, that was the low point of the year BY FAR! Stay tuned folks, more is to come in 2006.